Each year on this dates I prepare a workshop of tiki cocktails for Halloween, with new cocktails or adapted versions classics giving to it a tetric look. This year I’m going to share my recipes and you could do that on your thematic Halloween partys.

I hope that you like this and you will have a happy Alohaween!!!
]]>http://www.threeofstrong.com/alohaween-tiki-cocktails-for-halloween/feed/2Rum review: Compagnie des Indes Latino 5 anshttp://www.threeofstrong.com/rum-review-compagnie-des-indes-latino-5-ans/
http://www.threeofstrong.com/rum-review-compagnie-des-indes-latino-5-ans/#respondSat, 13 Aug 2016 16:58:23 +0000http://www.threeofstrong.com/?p=2438

Compagnie des Indes is a French independent bottler, the idea of the birth of that company was brought to life in memory of the former East India Company from the 17th and 18th century that selected rare commodities from distant continents and imported them to their countries. They assure that they select only the best rums from all the whole world, import and bottle it on Europe.

In their portfolio, they have some different expressions, some single casks and some selected blends, and they assure that always focus on bringing out the character and qualities of each local origin.

They also assure that their products don’t contain flavorings or sugar, with exception of some of their blends. And today, I’m going to talk about one of their blends, and I’m glad to tell you that in their web (not in the label of the bottle) they inform us that in this particular rum they added 15g/L of organic Cane Syrup. And I’m glad because it’s not usual in the rum industry inform to the consumer about the added sugar in the bottlings. It depends on you if you want to drink this rum, but this company is not cheating to the consumer as other companies do and for me is a great start. If you don’t like rums with a bit of added sugar, they have a lot of different expressions that for sure you could enjoy.

And well, I’m going to start talking about the rum: Compagnie des Indes Latino 5 years. In their web they define the rum as:

Made mostly from a blend of rums from Central America, (60% of rums from Guatemala) with a touch of Guyanese rums as well as some from Trinidad and Barbados, this blend brings out the characteristics of Latin American rums, with round and weedy notes.

For me it’s not a 100% latin style rum because it has in the blend 3 rums of 3 differents origins that not belongs to the latin style: Guyana, Trinidad and Barbados are rums of english style. But I could understand that containing a 60% of Guatemala rum they would want to call it Latino. And I have to recognize, that the touch of the english style rums makes it more appeticing to me.

The bottle comes inside a box and has a classical shape of rum bottle, made with dark green glass, it remains me a bit to the El Dorado rum bottles, that has a “piratesque” look. The label has the logo of Compagnie des Indes and a parrot illustration, with the Latino word and some indications about the rum “Vielli en barriques de chêne” and the age statement “5 years old”. In the side of the label they explain that this bottling is a blend made with the best rums from Guatemala and from others countries of Central America, and that it was aged in bourbon casks a minimum of 5 years.

For that tasting, I used my new Neat tasting glass (I’ll talk about it in a future post) and filling it with the rum I could look which hides the green glass of the bottle: the color of the rum. This rum has a pale gold color, it looks as a young rum has to look like. Swirling a bit the glass, I could observe some thin legs that I think that could be produced by the added sugar. Starting to smell it delicately, I detected some subtle aromas: tropical ripe fruits like pineapple and raw almonds.

Tasting it in my mouth, I found this ripe pineapple flavor that I also detected smelling it. I also found flavors of other fruits (like apricots), some honey and, at last, a bit of woody notes.

Clearly, it’s a light bodied rum, but more in the sweet side than in the usual dry side of the latin rums. For me, is a very easy to drink rum, it could be a great rum to introduce people to drink rum. I love the strong and bold rums and this rum don’t fit on my rum profile taste at all, but I know that each rum has this moment and for sure it would have a lot of moments with me.

This rum didn’t has distribution in Spain, it only was distributed in France, Denmark,Germany, Italy and Sweden, but if you are interested on it you could find it online in stores like this.

My friend Daniele dalla Pola remembered me that today is the Piña Colada Day and I need to make something special for today. The people that knows me a bit knows that I’m not the typical Piña Colada drinker, I always share my Big Kahuna Colada with the whole world, assuring that it’s the strongest brother of the Piña Colada…but today I want to share something similar but a bit different, a drink on my palate’s profile…the Piña Colada that a Zombie drinker could love…a fusion between the Zombie and the Piña Colada…Why not?

This next Wednesday 27th of april 2016 I’ll be in the exhibition Alimentaria making a master class titled “Coctelería Tiki con siropes Real”, in which I’m going to talk about Real Syrups, talk about the history of tiki drinks, explain the structure of a tiki cocktail and make some tiki drinks using Real Syrups.

After a time without publishing new posts, I decided to make a change in the original idea of the blog, it started as a blog in english, but now I want to open it to more public, making it accesible to the readers of spanish (my language).

It was a laborious process, because I decided to translate all the published posts since 2014 until today before I continue writing this project.From a few days ago, somebody could saw some posts in spanish or maybe somebody found the option of changing languanges, because I wanted to test it before I make it official.

The original blog was in english and the address will be the same: www.threeofstrong.com , but if you want to read it in spanish the link is www.threeofstrong.com/es . I activated an option which makes that the blog detects the language of your browser, if your browser is in spanish the web will load in english but automatically it will be redirected to the spanish version. In case that you have the browser in another language, the blog will load in english.

As you can see in the image, there’s a little menú on the right side of the blog where you could change the languages.

Also, in the footer of each post you could find the option of read this post in the other language.

From now, all the posts will be published at the same time in both languages, I will have the double of work to write it, but I know that a lot of people will be grateful with this changes and will value my work to make it possible.

Aloha!!!I’m still in the process of the certification programme of ACR (Authentic Caribbean Rum). I have taken part in the training sessions, and I have my diploma, now I prepared a cocktail and answered some questions to try to access to the second phase of the certification: the ultimate training session delivered in the Caribbean (as they announced, in Guyana, Barbados and Trinidad).

If you want to know more about this ACR certification programme first phase you could read this and this.

And now I’m going to present my cocktail…I have a lot of rums to choose and I want to make something tiki, but with a touch of classic and also a touch of craft cocktails.

I thought in a 1934 Zombie, but also in an Old Fashioned and in something smoked…I started working on how to reduce a 1934 Zombie into an Old Fashioned format…and when I have it…I started to try to make a smoke of one of the ingredients: Falernum. All served in a skull glass bottle used as a decanter full of Falernum smoke to drink in a Double Old Fashioned Glass with a twist of Lime with an ice ball, also smoked. The only problem was that ACR didn’t have overproof rum in his range, but I loved to use 3 great rums from Guyana, Barbados and Trinidad: El Dorado 15, Doorly’s XO and Angostura 1824.

If you liked my cocktail please vote it here . I need your help and you only have to click on the link and register in the web, it’s only 2 minutes and you could help me to improve my rum knowledge to make a better work in that blog…if I could go to the training sessions in the caribbean I promise that I will blog the full trip!!!!

Aloha! Today i’m going to continue with the cocktail videos with my other submission to the Angostura Global Cocktail Challenge 2016.

This drink is on the Freestyle Cocktail category where I have as requirements the use of at least one dash of Angostura Orange Bitters and no more than 6 ingredients. I could select the distillate that I prefer to use in that cocktail…and, of course, I decided to use RUM!!!!

I used Angostura 7 Years Old Rum, with a dash of Angostura Orange Bitters, and then, I tried to complement the flavor and aroma of the bitters with the other ingredients, making more tasty and subtle the bitterness in the cocktail.

The name of the cocktail is Alani Lā, in hawaiian language it means orange sun, that’s an indication about the moment and the place where you could enjoy this short drink: a sunset in a paradisiac hawaiian beach. The orange reflect the flavor, the aroma and the color of the cocktail, and the garnish (a rounded orange twist) makes us think in an orange sun.

You could find the recipe on the video…but I also do for you the printable recipe…as I use to do in the blog:

]]>http://www.threeofstrong.com/alani-la/feed/2Port of Spain Swizzlehttp://www.threeofstrong.com/port-of-spain-swizzle/
http://www.threeofstrong.com/port-of-spain-swizzle/#commentsThu, 08 Oct 2015 13:03:11 +0000http://www.threeofstrong.com/?p=1738At this time I want to show you something new on this blog that I never made before: videos. Yes!My own videos making cocktails!!!! The Angostura Global Cocktail Challenge 2016 was the excuse to start making it…I hope you could understand the mistakes that I could made on it, because I was a bit nervous as a first-timer, but…well!All is knowledge on my tiki way, and next time I’ll improve and try to do it better!!!

I’m going to talk a bit about the drink…it’s my Rum Cocktail for the challenge and I had to use at least 1oz of Agostura rums, 5 dashes of Angostura Aromatic Bitters and no more than 6 ingredients as a requirement. I knew the Angostura rums and I wanted to combine two of their rums, the 1919 and the 1824. I used the 1919 as a base rum, with his smoother taste with vanilla notes, and combine it with some 1824, more rich in flavor nuances and intensity, in which you could taste more the aging in the barrels. That’s how I found a more complex rum flavor for my drink. And the final flavor was rounded with a touch of Angostura Aromatic Bitters.

I called it Port of Spain Swizzle, to reflex the origin of the rums (Trinidad and Tobago and his capital Port of Spain) and also the traditional technique of the swizzle which I used to mix the drink.

I hope you could enjoy the video!!!!

You could find the recipe on the video…but I also do for you the printable recipe…as I use to do in the blog:

Essence Century Cocktail Competition is a spanish cocktail competition promoted by Campari Group. This competition challenge bartenders to make 2 cocktails that reflects the passion, the flavour, and the authenticity of Jamaica and United States, with two of their most charismatic brands and his legacy: Appleton Estate and Wild Turkey.

My first cocktail is a cocktail with Appleton VX called Legacy Swizzle, it aims to exalt the legacy of the Appleton distillery in the land of Jamaica. The roots of this are reflexed in an Appleton VX basis, bringing a touch of complexity with Appleton Extra 12 years and aromatic nuances of the popular allspice. The sweet, acid and citrus touches completes that drink, mixed with the traditional technique of the swizzle, making this cocktail a delight to your palate.

My second cocktail is a cocktail with Wild Turkey 81 called Dear Mr Wild, an elegant and amazing cocktail with citrus nuances, orange and grapefruit touches that fits perfectly with the bourbon, with a honey flavor typical from Kentucky, and the special bitter spiced taste who open the senses of any gentleman to another dimension.

The Bald Man’s Chest is my submitted recipe for the Iron Tikitender 2015, a tropical bartending competition to be held on July 11th of 2015 during Tiki Kon in Vancouver, WA.

That’s the first year that they accept bartenders from out of the US…and I think that I’m the only one non american bartender on it!

Today, I received bad news by mail from the event organization: my cocktail is not selected, I’m not between the three bartenders chosen and I couldn’t travel to the final. And I finally decided to share my recipe with the whole world to enjoy it at home (if you have all the ingredients!!!).

When I was thinking on it, the first thing was what kind of recipe I want to do for the contest. I decided to make a big, strong, very complex drink with a lot of layers of flavours and a lot of rum. A drink that can kick the ass of one strong drinker!!!

I was thinking about make a pirate atmosphere for my drink when I started to sing my own version of the song of the Dead Man’s Chest:

“Fifteen men on the Bald Man’s Chest…

…YO-HO-HO, and a bottle of rum!

Drink and the devil had done for the rest…

…YO-HO-HO, and a bottle of rum!”

And…I can’t explain more with words…you have to take a look at the pics!!!